Jyutping Information
Jyutping (pronounced [jyːt̚˨ pʰɪŋ˧], sometimes spelled Jyutpin) is a romanization system for Cantonese developed by the Linguistic Society of Hong Kong (LSHK) in 1993. Its formal name is The Linguistic Society of Hong Kong Cantonese Romanization Scheme. The LSHK promotes the use of this romanization system.
The name Jyutping (itself the Jyutping romanization of its Chinese name, 粵拼) is a contraction consisting of the first Chinese characters of the terms Jyut6 jyu5 (粵語, meaning "Yue language") and ping3 jam1 (拼音 "phonetic alphabet").
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Initials
| b /p/ 巴 | p /pʰ/ 怕 | m /m/ 媽 | f /f/ 花 | |
| d /t/ 打 | t /tʰ/ 他 | n /n/ 那 | l /l/ 啦 | |
| g /k/ 家 | k /kʰ/ 卡 | ng /ŋ/ 牙 | h /h/ 蝦 | |
| gw /kʷ/ 瓜 | kw /kʷʰ/ 誇 | w /w/ 蛙 | ||
| z /ts/ 渣 | c /tsʰ/ 叉 | s /s/ 沙 | j /j/ 也 |
Finals
| aa /aː/ 沙 | aai /aːi/ 徙 | aau /aːu/ 梢 | aam /aːm/ 三 | aan /aːn/ 山 | aang /aːŋ/ 坑 | aap /aːp/ 圾 | aat /aːt/ 剎 | aak /aːk/ 客 |
| ai /ɐi/ 西 | au /ɐu/ 收 | am /ɐm/ 心 | an /ɐn/ 新 | ang /ɐŋ/ 笙 | ap /ɐp/ 濕 | at /ɐt/ 失 | ak /ɐk/ 塞 | |
| e /ɛː/ 些 | ei /ei/ 四 | eu /ɛːu/ 掉[1] | em /ɛːm/ 舐[2] | eng /ɛːŋ/ 鄭 | ep /ɛːp/ 夾[3] | ek /ɛːk/ 石 | ||
| i /iː/ 詩 | iu /iːu/ 消 | im /iːm/ 閃 | in /iːn/ 先 | ing /ɪŋ/ 星 | ip /iːp/ 攝 | it /iːt/ 洩 | ik /ɪk/ 識 | |
| o /ɔː/ 疏 | oi /ɔːi/ 開 | ou /ou/ 蘇 | on /ɔːn/ 看 | ong /ɔːŋ/ 康 | ot /ɔːt/ 喝 | ok /ɔːk/ 索 | ||
| u /uː/ 夫 | ui /uːi/ 灰 | un /uːn/ 寬 | ung /ʊŋ/ 鬆 | ut /uːt/ 闊 | uk /ʊk/ 叔 | |||
| oe /œː/ 鋸 | oeng /œːŋ/ 商 | oek /œːk/ 削 | ||||||
| eoi /ɵy/ 需 | eon /ɵn/ 詢 | eot /ɵt/ 摔 | ||||||
| yu /yː/ 書 | yun /yːn/ 孫 | yut /yːt/ 雪 | ||||||
| m /m̩/ 唔 | ng /ŋ̩/ 吳 |
- The finals m and ng can only be used as standalone nasal syllables.
- ^ ^ ^ Referring to the colloquial pronunciation of these words.
Tones
There are nine tones in six distinct tone contours in Cantonese. However, as three of the nine are entering tones (入聲, Jyutping: jap6 sing1), which only appear in syllables ending with p, t, and k, they do not have separate tone numbers in Jyutping (though they do in Cantonese Pinyin; these are shown in parentheses in table below).
| Tone name | Jam1 Ping4 (陰平) | Jam1 Soeng5 (陰上) | Jam1 Heoi3 (陰去) | Joeng4 Ping4 (陽平) | Joeng4 Soeng5 (陽上) | Joeng4 Heoi3 (陽去) | Gou1 Jam1 Jap6 (高陰入) | Dai1 Jam1 Jap6 (低陰入) | Joeng4 Jap6 (陽入) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Tone Number | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 1 (7) | 3 (8) | 6 (9) |
| The tone name in English | high level or high falling | mid rising | mid level | low falling | low rising | low level | entering high level | entering mid level | entering low level |
| Contour[1] | ˥ 55 / ˥˧ 53 | ˧˥ 35 | ˧ 33 | ˨˩ 21 / ˩ 11 | ˩˧ 13 | ˨ 22 | ˥ 5 | ˧ 3 | ˩ 2 |
| Character Example | 分 | 粉 | 訓 | 焚 | 奮 | 份 | 忽 | 發 | 佛 |
| Example | fan1 | fan2 | fan3 | fan4 | fan5 | fan6 | fat1 | faat3 | fat6 |
Comparison with Yale Romanization
Jyutping and the Yale romanization system of Cantonese represent Cantonese pronunciations with the same letters in:
- The initials: b, p, m, f, d, t, n, l, g, k, ng, h, s, gw, kw, w.
- The vowel: aa (except when used alone), a, e, i, o, u, yu.
- The nasal stop: m, ng.
- The coda: i, u, m, n, ng, p, t, k.
But they differ in the following:
- The vowels eo and oe represent /ɵ/ and /œː/ respectively in Jyutping, while the eu represents both vowels in Yale.
- The initial j represents /j/ in Jyutping while y is used instead in Yale.
- The initial z represents /ts/ in Jyutping while j is used instead in Yale.
- The initial c represents /tsʰ/ in Jyutping while ch is used instead in Yale.
- In Jyutping, if no consonant precedes the vowel yu, then the initial j is appended before the vowel. In Yale, the corresponding initial y is never appended before yu under any circumstances.
- Jyutping defines three finals not in Yale: eu /ɛːu/, em /ɛːm/, and ep /ɛːp/. These three finals are used in colloquial Cantonese words, such as deu6 (掉), lem2 (舐), and gep6 (夾).
- To represent tones, only tone numbers are used in Jyutping while Yale traditionally uses tone marks together with the letter h (though tone numbers can be used in Yale as well).
Comparison with Cantonese Pinyin
Jyutping and Cantonese Pinyin represent Cantonese pronunciations with the same letters in:
- The initials: b, p, m, f, d, t, n, l, g, k, ng, h, s, gw, kw, j, w.
- The vowel: aa, a, e, i, o, u.
- The nasal stop: m, ng.
- The coda: i (except for its use in the coda /y/ in Jyutping; see below), u, m, n, ng, p, t, k.
But they have some differences:
- The vowel oe represents both /ɵ/ and /œː/ in Cantonese Pinyin while eo and oe represent /ɵ/ and /œː/ respectively in Jyutping.
- The vowel y represents in Cantonese Pinyin while both yu (used in the nucleus) and i (used in the coda of the final -eoi) are used in Jyutping.
- The initial dz represents /ts/ in Cantonese Pinyin while z is used instead in Jyutping.
- The initial ts represents /tsʰ/ in Cantonese Pinyin while c is used instead in Jyutping.
- To represent tones, the numbers 1 to 9 are usually used in Cantonese Pinyin, although the use of 1, 3, 6 to replace 7, 8, 9 for the checked tones is acceptable. However, only the numbers 1 to 6 are used in Jyutping.
Examples
"I am Chinese" using jyutping| Traditional | Simplified | Romanization |
|---|---|---|
| 廣州話 | 广州话 | gwong2 zau1 waa2 |
| 粵語 | 粤语 | jyut6 jyu5 |
| 你好 | 你好 | nei5 hou2 |
Sample transcription of one of the 300 Tang Poems:
| 春曉 孟浩然 | Ceon1 Hiu2 Maang6 Hou6jin4 |
| 春眠不覺曉， | Ceon1 min4 bat1 gok3 hiu2, |
| 處處聞啼鳥。 | cyu3 cyu3 man4 tai4 niu5. |
| 夜來風雨聲， | Je6 loi4 fung1 jyu5 sing1, |
| 花落知多少？ | faa1 lok6 zi1 do1 siu2? |
Jyutping input method
The Jyutping method (Chinese: 粵拼輸入法) refers to a family of input methods based on the Jyutping romanization system.
The Jyutping method allows a user to input Chinese characters by entering the jyutping of a Chinese character (with or without tone, depending on the system) and then presenting the user with a list of possible characters with that pronunciation.
List of Cantonese phonetic methods
- Yahoo's list of Cantonese IME
- Online Cantonese Input Method (網上廣東話輸入法)
- MDBG
- CantoInput
- Red Dragonfly
- LSHK Jyutping for Macintosh Mac OS X and OS 9 (The page also includes Yale input version 0.2)
- Smart Jyutping IME
- Waisek Chinese Input Method (緯石廣東話拼音中文輸入法)
- LSHK? (輕鬆粵語輸入法)
- Simplified phonetic? (粵語簡拼輸入法)
- Microsoft Office Hong Kong Cantonese IME (微軟香港粵語輸入法)
- Cukda Cantonese IME (速打粵語輸入法)
- MacJyutping Jyutping IME for Mac OS X (MacJyutping 輸入法)
Footnotes
- ^ MATTHEWS, S.; YIP, V. Cantonese: A Comprehensive Grammar; London: Routledge, 1994
External links
- LSHK Cantonese Romanization Scheme
- Jyutping Pronunciation Guide
- 粵語拼盤: Learning the phonetic system of Cantonese
- Chinese Character Database (Phonologically Disambiguated According to the Cantonese Dialect)
- The CantoDict Project is a dedicated Cantonese-Mandarin-English online dictionary which uses Jyutping by default
- MDBG free online Chinese-English dictionary (supports both Jyutping and Yale romanization)
- 粵拼易 JyutPingEasy.Net: a website that transliterates Chinese characters to Jyutping
- 粵音韻彙
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